How Much…How Many

HOW MUCH CARBON DOES YOUR COUNTRY PRODUCE?

Breathingearthis a fabulous site that offers an interactive map of carbon emissions, birth rates, and death rates in the world. It can be truly frightening to let it run for a while and see how much carbon and people we are adding to the world. Check out the different countries by highlighting them.

YOUR IPHONE USES MORE ENERGY THAN A REFRIGERATOR

The average iPhone uses more energy than a midsize refrigerator, says a new paper by Mark Mills, CEO of Digital Power Group, a tech investment advisory. A midsize refrigerator that qualifies for the Environmental Protection Agency’s Energy Star rating uses about 322 kW-h a year, while your iPhone uses about 361 kW-h if you stack up wireless connections, data usage, and battery charging…Learn more>>spectrum.ieee.org

Energy Efficiency at Home

Energy efficiency has become a very hot topic socially and politically in recent decades. As the world population grows, the consumption of energy grows. Countries with large populations and advanced economies are the highest consumers of energy. China, The United States of America, and Russia lead the world in energy consumption. The rate at which energy consumption is growing is scary, but have we found a solution?

India recently introduced a new program using LED lighting to test a new lighting efficiency. The results of the campaign may provide helpful insight for the rest of the world as we attempt to battle the growing energy crisis. The program didn’t rely on any fancy technology that requires super advanced economies; it focused on lightbulbs and improving a simple technology that even less advance countries use every day. While the results are limited and do not provide a full picture answer to the crisis, they show us that progress can be made.Learn more>> ledlights.co.uk

IMPACT OF CONSTRUCTION

…The facts are simple; we all need somewhere to live and work, and having good infrastructure for roads, railways and air travel helps enormously. However, although these developments benefit each of us individually, they also come at a cost.

The levels of global CO2 production are constantly increasing as indicated above, something that is further impacted by the felling of trees. Each year, we lose… Learn more>>

WHERE TO FIND RARE EARTH ELEMENTS

Every time I see a commercial for a new cell phone, I feel a bit nauseous. I love a new cell phone just like the next person, but because of my training as a materials scientist, I feel like a worker in a sausage factory. Cell phones, like sausages, may be great, but you don’t really want to know what it takes to make them…Read more>> pbs.org

But add in the amount of electricity it takes to move data across networks to deliver a total of, say, an hour of video to your smart phone or tablet each week, and over a year it adds up to more power than two new Energy Star refrigerators consume in a year…Read More>>spectrum.ieee.org

THE SURPRISINGLY LARGE ENERGY FOOTPRINT OF THE DIGITAL ECONOMY [UPDATE]

Our computers and smartphones might seem clean, but the digital economy uses a tenth of the world’s electricity — and that share will only increase, with serious consequences for the economy and the environment

Which uses more electricity: the iPhone in your pocket, or the refrigerator humming in your kitchen? Hard as it might be to believe, the answer is probably the iPhone…Read more>>science.time.com

THE COST OF TWEETING

Tweet Neutral Details

A carbon-neutral twitterer is a happy twitterer.

Several carbon footprint protocols have been developed, but there is no widespread agreement on the boundaries of and methodologies for measuring the true carbon footprint of products and activities. Some footprint calculations cover only direct energy use, ignoring the significant carbon impact of the inputs used in creating or using the product. Others are “cradle to grave”, and tend to overstate the impact by including downstream emissions beyond the control of the company.

The fact is, footprint modeling is an inexact science, as much as some would have you believe otherwise. In this case, we developed these estimates based on averages, baseline proxies, and best available data. We welcome and invite revised estimates and additional scope suggestions. On the measurement side, server energy consumption (including HVAC) in hosted facilities and the locations of these facilities would be welcome from Twitter, as would more exact behavioral data. Additional thoughts on cell phone vs computer energy usage are also welcome…Learn more>>climatepath.org

TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE AND COMMON SENSE IN THIS SIMPLE 10-QUESTION TEST.

Caution: This section contains sound science, not media hype, and may therefore contain material not suitable for young people trying to get a good grade in political correctness….Take the quiz>>rmcmi.org

HOW MUCH DO WE PRODUCE, CONSUME, RESERVE AND WHAT IS OUR CAPACITY, IMPORTS AND EXPORTS

SMART GRID VALUE TO A CONSUMER? $154.65 PER YEAR. AND WE CAN PROVE IT

Nov 12, 2013

…Because real-world experiences with the smart grid are growing, we reviewed actual – rather than forecast – benefits and costs. We sliced and diced nine different smart grid capabilities, such as time-varying rates, integrated Volt/VAR Control, and improved reliability. Then we quantified them into real-world improvements realized from those investments.Read more…smartgridnews.com

BIO FUELS – ENERGY CONTENT

VAMPIRE ENERGY: ESSENTIAL ANSWER

Believe it or not, there are vampires lurking in your house at this very moment. Not the bloodthirsty sort from Twilight, but energy vampires: appliances that silently suck electricity from your wall outlets and discreetly inflate your power bill. The small rechargeable appliances you mention are all guilty of wasting watts, as are other common household electronics like computers, televisions and microwaves. Even when turned off or in standby mode, these energy vampires continue to feed on the lifeblood of your electricity. What’s to be done?…Read more>>alumni.stanford.edu

Michigan has substantial natural gas reserves — more than any other State in the Great Lakes region — but is relatively limited in other energy resources. The State’s Antrim natural gas fields in the northern portion of the Lower Peninsula are among the largest in the United States. Michigan has some renewable energy potential, particularly from… http://www.eia.gov/state/analysis.cfm?sid=MI

6 OF 55 INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT …

Only 10% of energy in a light bulb is used to create light. Ninety percent of a light bulb’s energy creates heat. Compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs), on the other hand, use about 80% less electricity than conventional bulbs and last up to 12 times as long.g

Refrigerators in the U.S. consume about the same energy as 25 large power plants produce each year.e

Google accounts for roughly 0.013% of the world’s energy use. It uses enough energy to continuously power 200,000 homes.a

According to Google, the energy it takes to conduct 100 searches on its site is equivalent to a 60-watt light bulb burning for 28 minutes. Google uses about 0.0003 kWh of energy to answer the avenge search query, which translates into about 0.2 g of carbon dioxide released.a

On average, one pool pump consumes electricity equal to 44% of the annual electricity consumption of a typical California household. There are over 7 million pools in America.h

In the average home, 75% of the electricity used to power home electronics is consumed while the products are turned off. The average desktop computer idles at 80 watts, while the average laptop idles at 20 watts. A Sony PlayStation 3 uses about 200 watts and nearly as much when idle. Idle power consumes more electricity than all the solar panels in America combined.h

2 OF 22 INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT…

Nearly 50 million tons of e-waste (electronic waste such as cell phones and computers) is created each year around the world. This is enough to fill a line of garbage trucks across half the globe.f

Over 70% of e-waste ends up in China, where much of it is recycled in family-run workshops. Their methods of recycling are often rudimentary and can create serious environmental contaminants and health risks.f